First Light (27 page)

T
he wind was blowing the rain into my eyes, but there was no doubt about it. There was a human head out there, with the wind-driven waves of the rising tide slapping at its face.

“Nate!” I yelled. “Somebody's out there on the rocks!”

I put my rod on the beach and stripped off my utility belt and waders.

“That's crazy,” said Nate's voice.

I threw a look at him. He was keeping his eyes on his line as he reeled in. “I mean it, Nate,” I said. “Somebody's out there and he's in trouble if he's still alive. I'm going out there.”

The wind and rain were cold as I waded out along the sandbar. I felt the pressure of the east-flowing tide. It was as though it possessed a malignant will to push me into deeper water and wash me away toward Woods Hole. By the time I was halfway to the rocks, the water was deep enough to have filled my waders had I still been wearing them. To keep myself from being carried off the sandbar, I stroked with both hands like a swimmer.

I was on my tiptoes, and was sure I was losing my battle against the tide, when suddenly the sandbar was higher and firmer beneath my feet, and I was able to reach the rocks.

I was frightened and irked at the idiot who had gotten himself out here alone in the middle of the night, and now had gotten me in trouble, too. He was on the far side of a large boulder, and I worked my way around it, pushing against the waves and tide.

Jesus! It was Brady.

His eyes were shut and his face was white. I couldn't tell if he was dead or alive. I got an arm under him but couldn't lift him above the slapping waves. Somehow he'd managed to get himself tangled against the rocks with his own line. My fish knife was on the belt I'd left on the beach, but I had my pocketknife. I dug it out, opened it, reached down into the water, found the line, and blindly began cutting it. There were more loops than should have been possible, but I kept at it, and the moment came when Brady's body was suddenly loose.

I grabbed at him and lifted him higher. He weighed a ton.

I put a finger to his neck and felt a pulse. I got an arm around him and felt the push of the tide against the two of us. I'd never be able to get him back to shore.

“Nate!” I yelled. “It's Brady Coyne. He's hurt, and I can't get us back. Help us.”

In the rising light I could see Nate stare out at us, then suddenly lope nearer. He wiped rain from his
face and looked again, then shouted, “I see you. Can you hold on for a minute?”

I held Brady with one arm, got the other around a rock, and shouted, “Yeah, but I don't know how long.”

“Hang on.” He turned and ran down the beach toward our trucks.

I looked at Brady's face. His eyes were open. They were blank and unfocused, but they were open. I felt a rush of hope, and forced the fatigue from my arms.

Nate came lumbering back, carrying a coil of rope. He put the rope on the sand, cut the lure from his fishing line, and attached something in its place. “Catch this,” he shouted and made his cast.

The line came over my head, and I let go of the rock and grabbed it. He'd made a perfect cast with a three-ounce sinker. The tide shoved against us, nearly carrying me off my feet, and I grabbed again at the rock.

On shore, Nate cut his line and tied his end of it to the rope. “Haul out, Jackson, and I'll pull you in.”

I badly needed another two hands. Lacking them, I took a deep breath, then quickly let go of the rock, put the sinker in my mouth, ducked down, got both arms around Brady's body, and hoisted him as high as I could.

The tide washed hard against us, but as Brady's body rose in the water, his weight gave me the traction I needed to lift him partially atop the rock. I climbed up there with him and pulled the rope across as Nate fed it to us from the beach.

“Make it fast around both of you,” yelled Nate.

“You sure you can pull us both in?”

“Hell, I've caught bass bigger than the two of you combined. Now tie that rope around you, and let me get you in here.”

I tied the rope, then slid the two of us back into the water. The tide immediately swept us east. I was too cold and tired to be afraid. I hung on to Brady with one arm and swam with the other, and we arced toward the shore as Nate pulled us steadily toward safety.

Then there was sand beneath my feet, and Nate was there in the water, dragging us both ashore. I was so tired I could barely move.

“You two are a sorry-looking pair,” said Nate, untying the rope. “You okay?”

“I'm okay.”

Nate got on his knees beside Brady. “Well, well. Looks like your lawyer friend must have slipped out there and banged his head.” He brought a bloody hand from the back of Brady's neck. “Damned fool should never have gone out to those rocks. Not with the tide coming in.” He glanced inland. “He's probably suffering from hypothermia. We better get him up to the cottage out of the wind and rain. Then we should get a doctor to look at him. He may have a concussion.”

I climbed to my feet, and the two of us half-carried, half-dragged Brady up to the cottage. Inside, we found rotted floorboards supporting a battered table, a couple of chairs, empty beer cans, a pile of what had once been clothing, and other clutter.

“Let's get him onto the table,” said Nate. “We can
use those rags to rub him dry after we get him out of these waders.”

Brady's close-fitting neoprene waders had, in fact, kept him fairly dry below the waist. We stripped them off and then got rid of his wet shirt and rubbed him dry. By the time we had gotten a ragged, smelly, moth-eaten shirt on him, his eyes were again open, this time with more life in them.

We transferred him to a chair.

“Look at this. Just what we need.” Nate had found a thermos. “Coffee's still hot.”

I recognized the container. “That's Brady's. He must have been up here before he went out to the rocks.”

“Let's get some of it inside him. That ought to perk him up.”

We got him to swallow some coffee, and a bit of color came back to his face.

“Brady?” I put my face close to his. “Brady, can you hear me?”

He seemed to think that over, then, in a faraway voice, he said, “Needle.”

I felt happy. Brady might not be coherent, but apparently he could hear. “You're going to be okay.”

“Can't cast worth a damn,” said Brady.

“Sure you can,” I said. “You'll be back on your feet in no time.”

“Hooked in the ass,” said Brady. “Too much wind.”

“He's out of his head,” said Nate. “We'd better get him up to the house and call a doc.”

“Needle,” said Brady. He sounded irritated.

“Don't worry about the needle,” I said. “There's no needle here.”

“Haystack,” said Brady. “Hooked in the haystack.”

“He's got his needles and his hooks mixed up,” said Nate. “Come on, let's get him up to the house.”

“Give him a couple more minutes.” I looked at Nate. “You know what you've done, don't you? You saved both our lives.”

He tried to put fierceness in his face. “It don't mean nothing. I'd have done the same for a dog.”

“There's an old Chinese saying that if you save someone's life, you have to take care of him forever. I'm afraid you're stuck with that job.”

“Damned if I am.”

I put out my hand. “Thanks, Nate. I owe you my life.”

“You don't owe me nothing.”

I left my hand out. He glared at it, then gave it a quick, rough shake. “Damn it all to hell,” he said. “This don't mean we're pals, you know.”

“You may not be my pal,” I said, “but you can count on me to be yours when you need one. And Brady will tell you the same.”

“I don't need no goddamned Boston lawyer for a pal. Nor you either, J. W. Jackson.”

“Well, you've got us whether you want us or not, Nate. How are you feeling, Brady?”

“Needle,” mumbled Brady.

Nate looked around the room. “That's the third time he's said that. What in hell's he raving about? We supposed to look for some needle?”

I put a hand on Brady's forehead. He seemed
warmer than he had been when we'd first gotten to the cottage. “He's about ready for the trip up to the house,” I said to Nate.

“Finding a needle in this mess would be like finding it in a damned haystack,” growled Nate.

“There's no needle,” I said. “Brady's not really conscious. He doesn't know what he's saying.”

“I ain't been in here for a while,” said Nate as if he hadn't heard me. “Place is gone to hell.” He went through a door into an adjoining room.

Brady seemed comfortable enough where he was, and I was curious about the cottage, so I followed. The next room was even messier than the first, although the floor was in better shape. There were old bunk beds against the far wall. Their rotting mattresses were black with mouse dung and covered with litter.

“There's a cellar back this way,” said Nate, going through another doorway.

I kicked aside an empty whiskey bottle.

A moment later Nate was back. “Damnedest thing,” he said. “There's a padlock on the cellar door. Now, who the hell would put a lock back there?”

“Somebody who doesn't want other people in the cellar, I guess.”

“Yeah. But why? No matter. I got a sledgehammer that'll solve that little mystery.” Nate glared back toward the offending cellar, then irritably opened the sagging door of a closet and peered inside.

“Any needles in there?” I asked.

“Coyne's out of his head,” said Nate sourly. “There ain't no needles here or anyplace else. He banged his
head on the rocks and now he's dreaming his own private dreams.” He pushed the door shut. “Let's get him up to the house. This place stinks.”

He was right about the smell. Dirt, rot, mouse droppings, and other foul odors permeated the whole cottage. I remembered reading somewhere that after Edward II was taken prisoner, his captors in Berkeley Castle tried to kill him with poisonous fumes from a pit where they threw dead animals. Edward didn't die, so they resorted to even less pleasant means to get the job done. I didn't think the smells in the cottage would kill Brady, either, but they weren't making our stay pleasant.

“I'll get the Land Cruiser,” I said. “We can take him up in that.”

Nate nodded, although he looked big enough to carry both Brady and me to the top of Everest if he wanted to.

I
don't think I ever entirely lost consciousness after that needle rammed into my arm. The drug seeped into my brain and then gradually spread its pleasant numbness through my limbs, and I felt as if I were resting on a warm, feathery bed, or perhaps a bed of clouds, surrounded by a liquid, incredibly soothing darkness.

I thought, Isn't this nice!

I didn't have a care in the world. Whatever happened would be just peachy with me.

Jumbled thoughts, fragmented memories …

Arms under mine, helping me to my feet. Nice man. Helping me up. Whispering to me. “Brady.” He calls me Brady.

What's your name? I like you.

I want to cooperate. My feet. They are down there somewhere. Miles away. They're not mine. Pretty funny. I laugh, I think. Somebody else's feet way out there on the end of my legs? That's funny.

My legs don't work. I talk to them. Come on, legs. But they don't listen to me. That's how it is with legs.
They never listen to you. They just do their own silly thing. Funny old legs.

We're outside. Wet. Dark. I can see that. I can see the black. Can you see black? I can. It's a color all its own, full of texture.

He's got his arm around my back, holding me up, helping me down to the beach. I can hear the ocean. It's crashing, crashing. A beautiful, wet sound. A million drops of water bumping into each other. I can hear each individual drop as it collides with all the others.

Time? I don't know. Hours? Minutes? Maybe a week. We're in the water. No. I'm in the water. Very comfortable indeed. Yes, indeed. Sitting, now, leaning back. Very comfortable. Beautiful.

Bright light in my eyes. “Relax,” says the nice man. “Take it easy, Brady. Everything's going to be wonderful.”

Brady. That's me. Who are you? Who is this nice man? I can't see his face. Maybe he's a girl. But he's nice.

I'm relaxed. Just as relaxed as I can be. Nobody could be more relaxed. I'm the most relaxed person in the universe.

I want to tell this nice man how great everything is, but I don't think the words actually come out of my mouth. But so what? It doesn't matter. Nothing matters.

He's gone and I'm alone and it's peaceful and dark and liquid again, and I'm surrounded by crashing and sloshing and water. Water all around. Water drops bumping into each other. A symphony.

J.W. helped me sit up. He was holding a cup to my lips, urging me to drink. Images were whirling around in my brain, scattered and disconnected and elusive. I tried to slow them down and get a fix on them one at a time, but I didn't seem to have the energy for it.

I was very cold. Mostly, I just wanted to sleep.

But J.W. wouldn't let me sleep. He kept talking to me and making me sip the coffee. I remembered getting hit on the back of the neck, something suddenly pricking my arm.

A needle. That's what it was.

And J.W. was telling me how he saw me out there in the water, only my head sticking up. He thought I was dead.

So did I. But I didn't care.

Nate was there. Scowling Nate. Good old Nate.

They saved my life. Okay. Thanks, I guess. It didn't much matter.